Wildfire Smoke Plume Drifts Into San Francisco Bay Area
SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) -- A large smoke plume from several wildfires raging in the state, drifted over the San Francisco Bay Area Friday, casting a haze over the horizon and triggering an air quality advisory that will remain in effect until Sunday.
Air quality levels over much of the Bay Area remained at healthy levels, according to the Air Now, a federal government air quality website on Friday afternoon. But the levels dipped from moderately unhealthy to unhealthy as you traveled to eastern Contra Costa County.
For those heading to Lake Tahoe for the weekend, the skies were choked with smoke from the Dixie and Tamarack fires on Friday. Air quality levels across the lake ranged from unhealthy to extreme unhealthy.
Bay Area Air Quality Management District officials said smoke over the East Bay was from the McFarland, Monument and River Complex fires.
They said the smoke plume was aloft above 1,500 feet and was not expected to cause widespread unhealthy air quality across the Bay Area.
"Smoky, hazy skies will be visible across the Bay Area and smoke may impact localized regions such as in Napa, Sonoma and Solano counties, and higher elevation locations," district officials said in a release.
Onshore winds were expected to become stronger during the afternoon hours on Friday and Saturday along the coast, clearing out the smoke plume.
Last month, smoke from the massive Bootleg Fire in Oregon drifted east and caused hazy skies as far away as in New York City, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania.
